well let's see

[unfaithfulsfan]

I'm on the cusp of perhaps being able to finally get a graphics card (Take that my and my wife's ex's ) Looks like "W's"tax rebate might actually come to poppa this week! Provided the damn truck or the damn car don't decide to break down again!!

So back to my original quandary that had brought me to LR to begin with......
Which would you recommend:
Superclocked EVGA 8800GT (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130319) for $179
Or
XFX 8800 GT (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814150252)

Both are $179 each and both have rebates XFX=$30 EVGA=$20. But I've been reading horror stories about XFX not honoring rebates. Rebate notwithstanding, what do y'all think?

Thanks,
Jack

[vicaphit]

Get something with an aftermarket cooler and overclock it yourself. My single slot MSI 8800gt is stable at 675mhz, I don't know what you could do with something with a nice aftermarket cooler!

[DMB2000uk]

Skip the 8800GT and go for an 4850?

Or is that stretching money a bit to much?

Dan

[martini161]

xfx gave me the fastest rebate ive ever gotten. as fro which you go with, xfx, great service, and great warrenty. you could take a bath with your card if you wanted to and they would probably replace it

[unfaithfulsfan]

The 4850 would be lovely but has ATI improved that much with their graphics? It seems from all I've read, the 8800 GT is the way to go (for my price range, anyway) although I'm not an extreme gamer.

From the getgo I was torn between EVGA and XFX. Overall the reviews for the XFX cards were always better but then I saw the rebate/customer service issues. But again, Newegg's reviewers sometimes aren't exactly truthful, I think, but that's just my opinion. I know things I've ordered that have worked flawlessly got crappy reviews and vice versa.

I've got a few days to mull it over.....

Thanks,
Jack

[aircommando13]

I got $40 MIR from XFX, but it took 3 months Thankfully though they emailed me when they had gotten it processed a couple weeks after I mailed it and gave me a link to watch its status. As for performance, I don't think you'll notice the difference, only thing is XFX typically has cooler artwork on their cards and boxes

For $20 more you can get an EVGA 9800 GTX, which gives you about 10+ fps boost in games

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130339

[ratNukit]

Skip the 8800GT and go for an 4850?

Dan

I'd say the same thing. I just bought myself a 4850 and the little extra money over the 8800 GT is worth it. My buddy's got the same config ecxept for graphics card and harddrives and even Crysis is running more smoothly on my 4850 than on his 8800 GT ;).

[Bio-Hazard]

I'd go with the HD4850 as well for the price range right now.

I've seen a few reviews of the cards that included a 8800GT in the mix abd the HD4850 beat out the 8800GT in most if not all the benchmarks.

[unfaithfulsfan]

Pretty compelling arguments for the AMD corner. I'll have to mull that over since I have a couple of days to see if the IRS was telling the truth or if I'm going to get a "HA-ha"

Here's the voice of experience, should you ever get divorced (and I hope none of you ever do), do NOT be nice especially when it comes to credit cards. Your ex will swear up and down they'll pay it then they default and the balance of the debt becomes your income and the IRS levies a nice little tax bill about 6 years later after all manners of interest has been applied. So our friends at IRS nailed me with a $7200 tax debt on $4800 of "income" because it's so far "past due"

My current wife's situation? $14,500 on $10K.

Jack

[unfaithfulsfan]

Just thought of something. Can the 4850 run the F@H Graphics client? That's a big deal for me. I'd read someplace or other that ATI was one of the first to do this so I'm assuming it can??

Thanks,
Jack

[DMB2000uk]

Yes, you can fold on the 4850 as well.

Though how they fare in the long run for folding ppd wise is too early to tell. The current code doesn't take advantage of their increased shader units (from 320 in the 3870 to 800 in the 4850) so it needs to be tweaked, and on the other hand the nvidia cards are currently getting inflated high ppd scores as stanford is still working out the kinks so is giving them lots of little WUs that complete quick to get the code stable.

Time will tell how they settle down once both have been optimised and are doing real WU's.

From my experience of using the Nvidia client, it will sometimes slow down the OS to a crawl (it takes time to redraw windows and things) and you can't watch a movie while it is on, but people with the ATI client say that it doesn't interfere with general windows use at all.

Dan

[unfaithfulsfan]

Well, it would seem you've clinched the deal for me. Thanks once again, Dan. Don't know what I'd do without you!

Now just have to wait til Friday for the moolah.

Jack